Local Government Division Secretary Monzur Hossain said that over the past two years some 24,000 women worked on building 12,000 kilometres of earthen roads, essential for the country’s road network.

This gave them an opportunity to break out of the circle of poverty and to set up their own micro-enterprises thanks to government support. Not only did they achieve a certain degree of economic success this way, but they also reached a point in which they can play an active role in making decision about their families.

All this was made possible by the 'Rural Employment Opportunities for Public Assets (REOPA) project of the European Union, which provided 55 million Euro (US 74 million). The United Nations Development Programme provided additional funds.

In two years, “the women earned 48,000 taka (US$ 700) each, with about 20,000 put aside in savings accounts,” Monzur Hossain said. Such earnings are substantial in a country where many families live with less than a dollar a day.

“That is a lot of money for women who usually have no assets to their name because their husbands died, abandoned or divorced them or separated from them, very often leaving them to a life below the poverty line.”

EU delegation chief, Sweden’s Stefan Frowein, said women should tell their success stories to others so that they can be included in the employment generation scheme.